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Journalism of Courage
Over 20,000 security personnel, including Central Armed Police Force (CAPF), Tripura Police and Tripura State Rifles (TSR), would be overseeing security bandobast during the Lok Sabha elections in the two Parliamentary constituencies of Tripura this year.
A senior police officer on condition of anonymity said 84 companies of the CAPF (20,000 personnel), including Border Security Force (BSF) and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), have been deployed in the state to handle the election-related security arrangement. The officer added that 10,000 TSR personnel and a few thousand Tripura Police personnel have also been deployed.
Tripura Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Puneet Agarwal had last month said seventy companies of the CAPF have been deployed in Tripura ahead of the polls.
On Friday, the officer added, “The security forces have been deployed across all eight districts of the state to conduct flag marches and area domination exercises to instill confidence among people so that they can exercise their voting rights in a free and fair environment as per the Election Commission guidelines.”
The heavy security bandobast was made to ensure that the “Mission Violence Free Election 2024” announced by the Election Commission earlier last month is a 100 percent success.
Over 2,500 flag marches, area domination and patrolling exercises have been conducted by the CAPF personnel deployed in the state till now since last month.
A cache of contraband items, including drugs, worth over Rs 9 crore have been seized by the security forces from different parts of Tripura since last month. As many as 12,000 people have been detained under preventive arrests to maintain law and order.
The CEO has been attending several Systematic Voters Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) activities in different parts of the state recently to attract voters with innovative use of traditional art forms such as ‘alpona’ (customary Bengali artistic designs) to sensitise them about electoral processes.
West Tripura and East Tripura Lok Sabha seats – the two Parliamentary constituencies of Tripura — will go to polls in two phases – on April 19 and April 26, respectively.
